


The Dawn Will Come

by SirLadySketch



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Gen, Implied Lavellan/Solas, Implied Relationships, Jaws of Hakkon, Post-Game, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-26
Updated: 2015-08-26
Packaged: 2018-04-17 08:18:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,624
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4659375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SirLadySketch/pseuds/SirLadySketch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If there's one thing that Vivienne can't abide, it's standing by and doing nothing. Even worse to be stuck in the wilds doing nothing. Brooding is an absolute faux pas. Post-game, mid-Hakkon content. Spoilers for both. This is more or less a direct lead-up to Paper Trails.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Dawn Will Come

There was a distinct crackle in the air, one that promised many things. In the Frostback Basin, Scout Harding knew that it could mean any manner of things. 

It could be the start of a summer storm, whistling through the mountains and channeling the winds of an oncoming tempest down into the valley. Despite the snow-peaked mountains that towered in the distance, the valley itself held onto the moisture in the air, stirring up frequent, if not terribly long-lasting thunderstorms.

Or, it could be the a disturbance in the veil, the magics of the Hakkonites interfering with the natural order of things, causing a ripple that could be felt by even the Children of Stone. They’d stumbled across several sites where layer upon layer of spell had been woven into wards, fences, even the paths they walked. Harding knew that it would take weeks to rid her mouth of the sour taste of blood magic and rot.

“Have you seen the Inquisitor, my dear?” Vivienne 

Or the crackle in the air could be their resident First Enchanter, on the warpath through the wilds, no doubt taking affront to her accommodations so far from the main base of camp and looking for some hapless prey. 

Harding carefully set aside the maps she’d been reviewing, knowing that nothing short of her full attention would suit the mage. Vivienne sauntered up to the scout’s table, her stylish silks falling rippling gently in the crackling air around her. Harding cleared her throat and stood a little taller, giving the woman a slight inclination of the head in greeting.

“I haven’t seen her since this afternoon, I’m afraid,” admitted Harding, gesturing to the table. “Our scouts came in with more intel on the Hakkonites and I’ve been reviewing their field notes. I think she took off with Dorian and Bull, said something about looking for something she might’ve missed.” 

Vivienne, ever the lady, didn’t scowl per se, but there was a definite tightening of her lips, and the way in which she gazed out over the camp was a bit too casual. Harding cleared her throat, clasping her hands behind her back and shifting a little to stand in front of the delicate papers on the table. Any protection she could provide them from errant sparks that might leap off a mage whose mind was elsewhere. Vivienne, however, caught the movement and interpreted it correctly.

“You needn’t worry about me, my dear,” she laughed, patting Harding on the shoulder. “I am not some hedge witch newly come into power. When I mean to set something alight, the Maker himself will see the flames.”

Harding’s reprieve in figuring out how to respond to that came in the form of Cole sitting on the edge of the table, kicking his feet and flipping through the piles of paper.

“She didn’t even get to say goodbye,” he said, holding up a broken antler and turning it this way and that. “That is her biggest regret.” 

“Oh, decided to come along after all, did you?” Vivienne asked, turning halfway to the spirit and placing a hand on her hip. “We haven’t seen hide nor hair of you in weeks now, I thought you went back to where you belong.”

“I belong where I can help,” argued Cole, though he shrank back from her. He gently replaced the antler across the papers to weigh them down, then hopped off of the table to point off in the distance. “She asked me to come, so I did, but only because she said I could help.”

“I’m not sure how that’s true, given that she dragged all of us out here,” Vivienne quipped. Then she caught herself, closed her eyes, and shook her head. “Those of us who remain, that is. Is that what she’s doing, pining away for her lover?” asked Vivienne, sighing a bit. “Where is she then?”

“She’s gone, and so is the spirit who remembered for her,” answered Cole, peering at Vivienne curiously. “You were there when she spoke. Did you forget? Can I help you remember?”

“No, darling, that’s quite alright, I remember Telana and her sad tale well enough.” Vivienne turned back to Harding, shrugging an elegant shoulder and planting her staff in the ground, once. “I believe I have my answer then, Mistress Harding. I’ll leave you to your work.”

“Ma’am,” replied Harding, not a little glad to see the woman off in a swirl of sparking silks. Cole watched her go as well, then turned his solemn eyes on the dwarf.

“If an idea is almost there, sometimes you need to make it hurt a bit more to make it hurt less,” he explained. She frowned at him, but he simply shrugged. “It’s easier to talk about yourself if you pretend you’re not yourself, just so long as you don’t forget that you’re you.”

“…ok…” said Harding, trying to puzzle that one out in her head. She stared at the path the mage had opened in her wake, and not for the first time the dwarf was glad to see the other woman’s attention turned elsewhere. “But who is helping whom?”

Cole didn't answer; the spirit had disappeared once again.

\--

Vivienne found Dorian and Bull sitting in the boat, a hand of cards laid out in front of them. They did have the decency to appear startled when she stepped off the second boat, waving off the hapless fisherman as she made her way to the shore. Bull stood and offered a hand to the Enchanter, flushing a little as she narrowed her eyes, ever so slightly.

Dorian, for his part, took the opportunity to take a few cards from the deck.

“Before you go off yelling at us, the situation is perfectly under control,” he quipped, exchanging a few cards from the deck with those from his hand, and then laying down a set of dragons. “We did a sweep of the island first, and she’s armed to the teeth, and you can see her from here.“

“Did I say anything?” Vivienne asked, though she relaxed a bit as she caught sight of the Inquisitor within the remains of the hut. She shook her head, pulling a card from Dorian’s hand and laying it on one of Bull’s piles. “Give me a few minutes to talk to her, and then we’ll all be off. The sooner we get out of this barbaric cesspit, the better.”

For all her bluster, Vivienne walked up the hill at an easy gait, some of her earlier frustrations dispelling. She had offered to join the Inquisitor, after all, and had sworn to stay by the young woman’s side as she dealt with the inevitable fame and aftermath of all that had happened with the defeat of Corypheus. If that meant trekking through a land where half-nude abominations walked freely, and where Remli was just another Northern elf, well. Vivienne could play The Game in the wilds as well.

“Do you think they found each other, in the end?” Remli asked as Vivienne came up to stand beside her. The Inquisitor was staring at the fresh grave where they had laid Telana’s bones to rest. A ring of wild grasses and marsh flowers decorated the headstone, the remaining flowers loosely scattered on the dirt.

Remli’s face was remarkably clear for someone who was supposed to be weeping over her abandonment. Intent, even, rather than the sad, far-off look young lovers got when they were separated by distance. If they didn’t have yet another heathen god to stop, she would almost swear that the elf looked like she was plotting something that her advisors would most likely regret.

“That is a mystery none of us can know, my dear,” replied Vivienne, leaning down to move some of the flowers into a more flattering arrangement. “I could tell you yes, of course, true love always wins in the end, but we both know that I would be lying.”

Vivienne stood tall again, although she lowered her voice to finish her thought. “Of course, you do not suffer from a broken limb, my dear, simply a broken heart. And unlike the lady Telana here, you will rise up from this even stronger.”

“Is that how you tempered yourself, Madame de Fere?” Remli laughed, breaking her gaze from the grave at last.

“Of course, my dear. You cannot grow strong without first knowing weakness. Maker willing, you will not break when that blow comes, but you will rise, ever strong. Steel your heart and stand to face the dawn.“

“Ah yes, ‘the dawn will come,’” quoted Remli, standing at last and brushing the dirt and flower petals from her lap. “I suppose that leaves the stars for those whose stories are over, and for those who have not yet started their adventures. “

“A bit melodramatic and not a little bit heathen of a view for the Chant of Light, especially coming from the Herald of Andraste. But yes, all things have their time and place, if only we know what to look for. And one can never have too many dawns, my dear,” Vivienne mused, then gestured back to the boats on the shore. “Shall we?”

Remli paused for one final look at the marker, gave it a farewell pat, and then smiled at the mage.

“…I feel like I should have a witty one liner or some deep and meaningful thing to say. Maybe something about making this god see stars and making it his last dawn, except that the Avaar keep reassuring me that he’ll be perfectly alright after we kill him, and I’m not up to spinning witty one liners at the moment,” she admitted, then shrugged. “Let’s go stop the bad guys…. Again.”


End file.
